A little while back Bob Kronbauer from VancouverIsAwesome.com hit me up to see if I’d be interested in contributing a short series about the Vanier Park Dirt Jumps – something that could explain a bit of the process that happens behind the scenes of getting a project like that to become a reality. I’m always keen to get the word out about these kinds of projects, and Vancouver Is Awesome is exactly the kind of platform that’s perfect for this series. I’m really down with the VIA concept, so I’m quite happy to do put some time into this. And, maybe somebody will learn a thing or two and be inspired to make something like this happen in their neighbourhood/town/city. I’ve got over 15 years of experience working with city councillors and park boards on skateparks, so I’m happy to share some of my ideas.
I’ll admit it’s quite a challenge to edit down the past 10+ years of this process into a digestible (short), interesting story. People aren’t likely to sit down and read a story like this on a blog, so this series will merely skim the surface of the process, but maybe people will be interested in knowing a bit more about how much work goes into getting a skatepark or dirt jump facility made. They just don’t magically show up one day. Public projects like this drag on for years, and are mostly uninteresting, so I’m interested in what kind of feedback we get on this.
I’ll be sure to come back and add links to the other parts of the series as they go live, but for now, you can start here:
Part 1 – In The Dirt Series! Part One: Vanier Park History
Part 2 – In The Dirt Series! Part Two: Coming Together
This is great timing for this series to come out – fresh off the very successful launch of the Vancouver Skateboard Coalition’s Kensington Park skatepark/pool (the last 2 pictures shown here), we’ve had a lot of momentum as of late, and a lot of the projects we’ve been working years on are all coming to completion by end of summer.
